I should have been more like Santa!

I'm pretty sure that when Santa had a list he checked it twice.  This is good advice.  If I'd followed this advice I wouldn't have some vague memories of making a list in early September which had a space for whether or not the quilts I am planning to show this weekend had a hanging sleeve on ..... clearly with the idea that if it didn't and needed one, I would address that in good time.

Oh no.  I didn't follow the advice.  As a result of this I have 10 quilts that are completely fine but one rogue quilt without a sleeve!  Cue a little late-in-the-day sewing in order to put one on.  My top 'cheats' tip?  If you sew the top seam from the front in the ditch along the binding, no one will notice it, and you'll have halved the hand sewing that you need to do.  Makes the job a lot faster for me!

I couldn't lay my hands on a matching strip of fabric, so sewed on something that will come off again after the weekend.

You'll be able to try and spot all 11 of these little lovelies if you can make it to the Richmond and Kew Quilters show which is on at The Landmark Centre in Teddington.  Hope to see you there!

 My other hand sewing at the moment is finishing the binding on this baby quilt.  It will probably be finished tonight.

The making of 'Wild Women' went well with DD2's friends last Friday, so I've made another 15 bodies ready for DD1's friends to come and complete this Friday.  Now I can decide what to make with the 1 1/2" x 5" strips that I have left from cutting these out from charm squares!

Fun and scraps - all good!

 



Wild Women, Love Entwined and Coincidence!

 Last night some gal pals and I made Wild Women - inspired by the beautiful originals by ThreadAddict here.

Whilst ours don't match up to the care and skill employed on the originals, they do have their own charm, even if they look as though they've just rolled out of a night club at 3.00am on a Friday morning and are going to regret their hangovers in the morning!

 These are the ones that I've made so far this month, partly as little extras for the craft stall at the Richmond and Kew Quilters show (Friday 23rd to Sunday 25th October - hope to see you there!) and partly as trials to see if they are easy enough for my daughters and their friends to make their own versions.  The jury is still out on that!

 I also realised that although I'd shown you my Love Entwined quilt whilst it was being blocked, I hadn't shown you it on the wall.

It greets us as we enter the house now.  I've shown you how it is, hanging over the keyboard where DD2 practices every day.  I didn't want to show you that, though, just the lily flower on the plant to the right that really looks like the one on the quilt (from the bottom RH vase). Hard to pick out, but it's there in pale pink!

Here it is shown in all it's glory!  I wish that I was a better photographer - it does actually hang straight on the wall, not wonky!

My machine sewing this week has been to make replacement café curtains for our bedroom.  Not the most exciting sewing to do, but I was able to use some lovely seed scattered 'Je ne sais quoi' fabric for it.  Nice to have a change from the ones that had been up for the last 20 years and which were starting to look a bit tatty!

Finally, the coincidence is that this is my 289th blog post and also the day when I've just put my 289th book into my Kindle folder of 'Plum's read this'.  Not enough to set the world alight, but I'll be looking around to see if there are any other 289 'things' today!

Hope that you are having a burst of autumnal creativity this week - or just some fun coincidences!

Cheerful Disappearing Sashed 9 Patch!

I've been meaning to make this block for a few weeks now, since I saw a video of how to make it by the Missouri Star Quilt Company.  You will probably want to watch their video, but I'm going to set out the steps for how to make it here, just in case I want to remind myself of it again without video!

1) Set out your fabrics (mine are 5" charm squares and 2 1/2" strips of sashing.  Bear in mind the five charms that make the cross shape will be chopped up, so if you want to retain a particular motif whole make sure that it goes into one of the corner squares.

 2) Sew together.  You can see why it's called 9 patch window pane too, can't you?

3) Cut into quarters.

 4) Decide on your layout.  This is a great one that doesn't rely on seams matching up (!).

5) This is the layout that I chose this time around.

Sew the quarters together.

Obviously, you might want to make a quilt with more blocks than this, but as I was making just one to see what it was like, I turned it into a  baby quilt with a couple of borders.

 You can see it (well, the quilt top - I haven't backed, basted and quilted it yet) here on my design wall. 

The block itself comes out as 17" square (I think!).  I added three borders (white, batik with cornerstones, white) each cut 2 1/2" wide, so I have a finished baby quilt of about 29" square.

It's really cheerful!  It makes me happy to be sewing!

I also added a fusible design to a t-shirt that was too plain.

I used the shapes from pilofabrics raw edge applique tutorial, added fusible and fabric, and then outline stitched them.  A fast and easy way to add a little decoration!

 Finally, I hung up my Dear Jane.  Of course, as it's on a turn in the stairs it can't be snapped without the banisters in the picture too, but it too makes me feel cheerful every time that I see it!

This is the view that I usually have of it, looking up at it.

This is how it looks from above.  The other part of it, the little bit, won't be hung above the window until it's had an outing to my group's quilt show later this month - I think that it's a task that DH and I will only want to do once!

Hope that you can find things to make you cheerful too!